In The Yellow Time Of Pollen
by ThunderheadFred
Summary: Velocity and time make for curious bedfellows, especially when Kallo Jath flies out to meet his biological imperative.
1. Fields Ablaze

**Notes:**

Full disclosure: I haven't had an opportunity to finish Andromeda yet. If I notice any glaring inconsistencies when I'm more familiar with the game, I'll fix them as needed. (As of September 2017, I've made a few minor edits) **  
**

Regarding romantic/sexual content, my intention is not to erase or invalidate Kallo's inborn asexuality, but to explore a fluid spectrum that most salarians are never expected to navigate. I tried to keep salarian reproduction and (a)sexuality as close to canon as possible, and filled in the gaps using several biological sources. All this to say: interspecies awkwardness inevitable.

Title and poetry excerpts are from _Totem Poem_ by Luke Davies.

* * *

 _In the yellow time of pollen when the fields were ablaze_  
 _we were very near bewildered by beauty._

* * *

"So... What do you think?"

Sara throws her arms wide - _TADA -_ gifting Kallo an entire world.

It is a heartfelt mime. He gets the impression that Sara might like to wrap the planet in a bow, declare it _Sur'Kesh: Mk. II,_ and give Kallo first dibs on his choice of continents. Luckily for everyone, Havarl already belongs to the angara, and Kallo has no taste for untamed wilderness.

Still, he is forced to admit the appeal. Even with its crazed ecology, this world is a natural prize.

Rich blue atmosphere alive with thunderclouds, hiding glimpses of a titanic gas giant in the reaches beyond. Daring swirls of pink and fuchsia and violet in the roiling skies, luscious greens and oranges and purples in the clamoring foliage below. A soft after-mist of rain filters through endless knotting ferns, leaving a smell of ozone and spent lightning. Phosphorescence falling from a dozen species of poisonous fungi. Chattering songs of birds and insects around their heads... and who knows what else lurking further in the dark.

Met with such violent beauty, Kallo makes a confused and noncommittal noise. Sara's shoulders slump.

The unlikely pair is perched awkwardly on the nose of the _Tempest,_ where they have a first row view of the teeming jungle below. Spread out on an industrial blue tarpaulin for an impromptu picnic, they are out of doors (at Sara's insistence) - but remain well within the wingspan of the ship (at Kallo's.) Sara had seemed unnaturally eager to get her pilot out of the cockpit and onto solid ground for once, no matter how short his tether.

It is only now - amid the sharp-toothed splendor of a planet gone wild, staring into the overeager face of Sara Ryder - that Kallo realizes his error in agreeing to this meeting. Like Havarl, Kallo suspects the Pathfinder's company might be safest if enjoyed from a respectful distance. This informal outing has all the telltale signs. Twilight skies at noon, a meal taken in shared solitude, an atmosphere so romantic he can hardly breathe - though that could be the pollen.

He wants to ask, _is this a date?_

Instead, Kallo stares at Sara, Sara stares at Kallo, and neither says a word.

A palm-wide insect with faceted, iridescent eyes lands on Sara's head and beats its heavy wings against her hair. After a moment, the insect begins cleaning a pair of pillowy antennae with its forelimbs, snarling several of Sara's smooth, dark strands in the process.

It looks painful, but she hardly flinches. Kallo swats the insect away, offended.

"Be nice," she mopes, her gray eyes narrowing.

Kallo watches Sara's attacker buzzing weightily into the distance before responding. "That thing was going to carry you back to its nest," he grouses, an air of certain doom on his breath.

"To its _hive,"_ she corrects. Snottily.

"Whatever. It was going to carry you away to some dark place forgotten by civilization. To eat you. Slowly. Probably suck you straight through a straw."

She rolls her eyes, then gestures at the sweating landscape. "Fauna aside, don't you _like it?"_ she whines and moves closer in her nervousness, looking as if she's holding back the urge to pitch him overboard. "I know it's not quite Sur'Kesh, but..."

He frowns at the shimmering residue of unspecified bug on his hand, then looks around helplessly for somewhere to wipe it off. Not his jumpsuit - pure and clean as bleached air - that would be a crime.

Sara sighs, offering the scuffed arm of her filthy leather jacket.

After a few short weeks in the improvised Pathfinder's care, anything factory-fresh might as well be decades old and nearing retirement. The rusty red leather of Sara's favorite jacket is already creased and covered in the muck of half a dozen foreign worlds. One more stain will merely add complexity to the patina.

Kallo wipes his hand back and forth along her proffered arm, trying for a haughty noise. It comes out endeared by mistake.

"I've always hated the jungle," he announces in a dry voice. "There's too much unpredictable wildlife." He inserts a condescending grin. "Like you."

"Whine all you want," she bites back at him. "I'm just glad to see you out of that damn chair."

Her glare softens and is slowly overtaken by a persistent, crooked smirk that she struggles to hide.

Another native insect crawls along her jacket and he flicks it away, letting his hand rest on her shoulder. Her slate blue scarf tickles his knuckles, and he wonders if she's too warm. The air is moist and thick, it feels palpably alive, like the inside of a lung.

"Sorry I'm not more... Ah. Adventurous. I appreciate you thinking of me," he says, feeling every word. More than she can know.

"Oh I'm usually thinking of you, Kallo." She croaks, voice wavering.

He lets his hand fall from her shoulder.

To break the tension, she pries open a small plastic box of provisions. Sorting through the contents and emptying some into her lap, she adds, "Laying awake all night, praying you're not about to steer my ship straight into the Scourge."

It's not a particularly graceful dodge, and Kallo isn't an idiot. _"Your_ ship? Really, Ryder? You'll have to fight me for her."

She hands him a neat triangle of soft, pale bread: a simple human offering. Handmade, by the look of it. He takes a curious sniff, finds the smell salty-sweet, tentatively appealing.

"I didn't know what to bring," Sara stutters, looking nervous. "Picnic stuff. I'm not exactly handy with recipes. Cora said to use the cricket protein supplement. I stole some of Jaal's paste, too - it's in here somewhere. But. I panicked and made peanut butter and jelly. Um. Are salarians allergic to peanuts? Lexi said it was fine..."

She's babbling.

He takes a bite to appease her. Mild and soft and chewy. Different, and it gums up his teeth, but all things considered the mouth-feel is familiar and pleasant. He nods approvingly.

"S'good." He says, meaning it in too many ways to count.

* * *

Whatever it is, he likes what they have.

On a visit to Prodromos, she runs along the length of the ship, boots clattering across the gleaming hull. He supplies biting commentary, secretly wishing he could join her.

On the bridge, she dutifully scans orbital wreckage, then pokes him in the back of the head before heading for the galley. In retaliation, he chases her belowdecks and steals the food right off her plate.

At night, when he thinks he's the only one left awake, she wanders out of her quarters and drifts onto the bridge, sleepy and dreamlike. Asks him to dance the _Tempest_ through an asteroid belt, chasing the flaming tail of a comet.

She leans over his chair, arms naked, enfolding him. Unfamiliar skin, dark and warm from the alien sunlight she is always walking through. Her cheek touches his face, lightly, briefly, and he feels her smiling.

 _Thanks for the lift,_ she whispers.

Wherever he brings her, she returns with tokens of an adventurer's affection.

A shard of chitinous carapace stolen from a giant beetle analog. It glitters like a slick of oil on his control panel, winking at him in the dark.

A coiling fern nicked from the _Nexus_ hydroponics bay. It is the color of sun-dappled canopy and light as a feather. She tickles it gently between his horns and runs away before he can smack her.

A ball of snow from Voeld, fresh-packed and weeping in her hand. She shoves it down the back of his jumpsuit along with five hot fingers and an unspoken question.

He doesn't care, and she doesn't push. Here and now, just as it is, whatever they have, it's worth keeping. Even if it ends quickly, if she gives up and moves on, if biology prematurely stifles this fascination, his memory will hold these moments preserved. Rare and crystalline.

He will never forget how it feels to soar through the bright center of a new galaxy, to be the favored satellite of a burgeoning star. In her orbit, he feels weightless. Uplifted. Instead of steering the ship, he is letting her take him for a ride.

One day, that might catch up with him.

But not yet.

* * *

Irrespective of whatever Sara has planned for Kallo on Havarl, the jungle has no patience.

They don't even finish lunch before another storm rolls in. Lightning, silent at first, forking across the sky to the east. The flash reflects dazzlingly off of the _Tempest's_ hull, blinding them both. Sara flinches and turns to look.

"Looks like our parade is about to be rained on," she says. "Still, got you out of the house for a minute, didn't I?"

"You did. Well done, Ryder."

Glancing back at him, she flashes a sad little smile. "Would you quit calling me _Ryder,_ already?"

Another bolt of lightning splits the sky, chased by a still-distant rumble. Her face is illuminated like a beacon, smile reaching towards him through the twilight.

"Sara. You're trying to get me in trouble."

"Yeah. If we don't move, we're gonna get drenched. Maybe we'll die of _space pneumonia."_ Her voice feigns concern, but her grin is as hungry as the jungle.

Something roots him to the spot. The same stubbornness that threw him from the Milky Way, that put him at the helm of a starship. Impulse and momentum, they've carried him this far.

"Hm. We _could_ move. But we just sat down..." He says.

Kallo offers her his hand. She takes it.

Rather than running for cover, They wait together for the storm to arrive, watching as the clouds open up and pour a wall of solid rain out of the sky. It advances, dense as a wave. When it hits, the water slaps him like a hot shower, hard and warm and absolutely inescapable.

Sara screams, laughs, and holds his hand tighter.

In his palm, her fingers are many and small. He runs a thumb along her extra digits, smoothing the rain into her skin, wondering.

 _Why leave a good story half finished?_

* * *

Holding hands. Of course there would be consequences.

A few days after leaving Havarl's orbit, Kallo's fingers start sticking to his control panel.

At first he worries that he's gotten sloppy during his trips to the galley. Not like him, but not impossible. No amount of scrubbing or scouring seems to rid his fingers of their new tackiness, however, and there is no sugary residue to be found.

No, it's Kallo. His own skin, turned against him. The pads of his fingers. Suddenly, inexplicably... clinging to everything he touches. He remembers Sara's unfamiliar hands in his, the temptation to melt together in an extraterrestrial monsoon with a girl from another world, and he imagines he's contracted some deadly disease.

Whatever the reason for his newly adhesive fingers, trying to navigate with his hands glued to the array is pure hell, and he hates wearing gloves.

He waits until the first sleep shift change, when no one will notice him straying from his post. Then he sprints down to med-bay and catches Doctor T'Perro as she is packing up for the evening.

He shoves his hands under her nose.

"I'm sticky." he says.

She stares. He waits until he has her undivided attention, then touches the tips of his fingers to the data-pad in her hand. When he tries to shake it off, the pad clings to him as if permanently fixed. He waves it around like a hostage.

"I'm sticky." he repeats, less confident now. "Help?"

The doctor claps her hands together and smiles from ear to ear, looking as if he's thrown a surprise party especially for her. An uncomfortable lump rises in Kallo's throat, and he swallows thickly. Oh no.

She twists and turns the data-pad, examining the points of contact.

"What a thrill!" She is practically singing. "When did this begin?"

"Today," he says, straining to feel the thrill Lexi is referring to.

While he frets, the doctor stares off into space, visibly calculating.

"Delayed onset," she mumbles, mostly to herself. "But lucky. It worked! Have you noticed any other changes?"

She throws him a look. He blinks.

It's a dirty look.

"Clever of you," she says around a crazed smile. " _Romantic_ , even. Well done."

"What?"

"That luncheon in the rain with Ryder... I can't believe it _worked!"_ Her voice drops an octave, tones going conspiratorial. "Oh this is exciting! I wonder if it was the humidity? Temperature shift? Something in the electrical field carried by the storm, maybe? Hard to say. Almost unheard of to see a spontaneous natural response anymore. Political couplings are all induced. Will you let me run some tests?"

She paces, then rifles through her omni-tool databanks while he gapes. "Hmm. I have some asari literature that may help, but I don't think there's ever been a clinically documented encounter with a human partner. Have you told Ryder yet?"

"What? No. _What?"_

 _"_ I assumed..." She goes quiet when she sees the expression of runaway confusion on his face. "I thought the two of you? I thought..."

They stare one another down.

"You grew up on Sur'Kesh, yes?" the doctor asks finally, her pace markedly slowed. "They never educated you. You were meant to be a drone for the bureaucracy."

"I'm not a drone!"

Kallo flinches and tears his hand off the data-pad. Lexi looks at her reclaimed tech, blinking slowly. Realizing her mistake, she apologizes with her whole face, then puts a soft hand on his shoulder.

"Of course. I'm sorry. I didn't mean... I quite agree. You're not a drone. You deserve the right to make an informed choice."

He wrings his hands and struggles to follow. "Doctor... Can we just fix the sticky fingers, please?"

"Nothing to fix. Your fingers are perfectly fine. Long dormant nuptial pads awakening. The first sign that you're undertaking a season. You should be able to control the grip in time, you just need some practice."

Silence.

"Undertaking a season? You mean..." He stares at his hands, scarcely breathing. "Nuptial... A _mating season._ But I thought..."

"Are you telling me that there is _still_ no compulsory sexual education on Sur'Kesh?" The doctor's face darkens with annoyance. "Everyone deserves free access to the same basic information, even those who aren't chosen..." She realizes she's rambling at a social cause six-hundred years lost, and closes her mouth. More professionally, she adds, "Kallo. I was under the mistaken impression that you triggered the cycle deliberately. This must be a shock. I'm sorry."

He must look more hopeless than he realizes, because Lexi adopts a deliberate, tender expression and shows him to a chair.

"Misinformation abounds when it comes to salarian sexuality, nowhere more than on the homeworld itself. I'm sure the dalatrasses would love you to believe that reproduction is only for the genetic elite... But no. A season can happen to anyone, given the right conditions."

The conditions had been met. Exceeded.

Sara backlit by a storm. Her skin glittering with mist. Her body, her face, the air between them; too close. Charged with some alien current, he stares at her mouth.

The first crack of lighting through the seething blue. Sara, her eyes bright with disbelief, turning to stare at the illuminated beasts that live in the clouds. She gasps and holds his hand. The smell of her mixing with the damp and the rain. He'll never forget.

"You're going to start experiencing some changes. But there's nothing to be afraid of."

He wishes that were true.


	2. Blue Lilac Weather

_in the blue lilac weather, she had written a letter:_  
 _You came into my life really fast and I liked it._

* * *

/ Hey.  
/ You got a minute?  
/ Hello. Ground control to Major Tom.  
/ Stop ignoring me. I know you're up there.

/ / Busy, Ryder. Not crashing the ship and everything.  
/ / Wait. Who's Major Tom?

/ Remind me to give you my Nomad mix. You're behind the times.

/ / Oh joy.

/ Listen, I'm not trying to hassle you, but you've been quiet.  
/ I wanted to check in. Make sure everything's okay.

/ / Okay.

/ Gil's not fiddling again, is he? I can smack him around for you.  
/ Or just wipe the floor with him next time he and I play poker...  
/ Are you okay?  
/ You don't have space pneumonia, do you?

/ / Maybe. My head feels funny.

/ Funny, huh? Mine too.

/ / You were born funny in the head. It doesn't come quite as naturally to me.

/ Yeah, I'm an expert!  
/ You can always talk to me about it.  
/ If you want. You don't have to.  
/ Gah. I know I'm not a great listener.  
/ I can shut up every once in a while.  
/ Occasionally.  
/ When it's important.

/ / I'll believe it when I see it.

/ Right.  
/ I guess I hoped we could talk about this in person?  
/ Kallo?  
/ Throw me a bone here.

/ / Bad idea.

/ C'mon - mixed signals!  
/ I don't know what a salarian crush looks like, but…

/ / Don't make this into a joke.

/ I'm not. I'm not joking.  
/ Straight talk: do you care about me as more than a friend?  
/ You don't even have to explain. Just a simple yes or no, and I'll drop it.

/ / First of all: there's no such thing as a salarian crush.

* * *

When Kallo meets Andromeda's first Pathfinder, _his_ first Pathfinder, he is nervous and alone.

The meeting is completely unplanned. Sara Ryder stumbles onto the bridge of the _Tempest_ with her mouth agape, forcing Kallo to stop - mid launch protocol - and do all the formal introductions himself.

Personally, he would have preferred to stand on ceremony. The historical significance of this occasion ought to merit pomp and circumstance, not this nod and wink routine from Vetra. Giving the _Tempest_ a surprise debut has roguish kind of charm, but it's a far cry from cheers and champagne, nothing like the grand ceremonial launching Kallo had been promised back in the Milky Way.

Alec Ryder had been a towering figure, and his daughter lacks all of the intimidating magnetism of someone pre-ordained. Rather than the air of a legend in the making, Sara Ryder is diminutive and intensely curious. A child abandoned in a theme park. Or set loose on one. Kallo can't be sure.

Despite her disqualifying lack of poise, the new Pathfinder seems eager to make good on the Initiative's six-hundred-year-old promise. Ryder takes Kallo's offered hand with easy friendliness. She smiles at him ear-to-ear. Everything about her strikes him as small and rough, starting with her hand. She has calluses on her knuckles, he can feel them tickling against his palm.

He watches as she soaks up the _Tempest,_ eyes roving across every inch of the consoles. She studies the fine details of her future post, trying to memorize this moment in its entirety.

A powerful familiarity floods his nerves, as if she's read his mind.

He recognizes the intoxicated way she stares at the ship, the slack jawed wonder that transforms her, transporting her through space and time. She has the face of a dreamer.

He loves her instantly.

* * *

He doesn't realize that in the moment, of course.

Eidetic memory is tricky. Clear as crystal but just as fragmented. Light cast through a heart choked with inclusions, throwing a full spectrum of perfect but scattered colors. The struggle comes from trying to stuff the rainbow back into the prism.

Kallo is not afraid of his own escape velocity, the irresistible pull of his dreams. The call to spaceflight makes him infamous on Sur'Kesh and a darling of the Initiative. When Lucille assigns Kallo to be the _Tempest's_ test pilot, it is because he has what she calls _the bootstrap impulse._

"All the more romantic because it springs from the soul of a salarian," she tells him with a wild grin, immediately upping his pay.

With stars in his eyes, Kallo reaches for the impossible horizon, and now that he finally cradles it in his hands, he's not sure what to do with it. Often, more often than he knows, he looks at Sara and forgets what he wanted to say.

Sara Ryder, his Pathfinder. With permanence and power, transfiguring the dead rocks of Andromeda into a necklace of golden worlds, she forces Kallo to question the quality of his own atmosphere. He digs through his mind, impoverished for words.

He's not as hopeless as he likes to think. Obviously, the word he's looking for is _love._

* * *

The word he actually finds is _help._

First, the sticky fingers. With Lexi's calm assistance, Kallo masters control of his nuptial pads in the span of a few concentrated hours. While the doctor teaches him to pick up pens and coffee cups and data pads like some kind of flailing infant, she tries to tackle the subject of Kallo's relationship with Ryder.

She finally gives up when her third attempt meets a stubborn wall of silence. He almost feels bad about it. Almost.

No use spreading rumors. There's nothing to spread. Nothing is going to happen. He's not about to mire the Pathfinder in a swamp of uncomfortable biological inconveniences. Rebuilding civilization takes precedence over the alarming and foreign developments in a single disobedient crotch.

Salarian mating season. Even Kallo doesn't want any part of it. He barely understands the implications of the changes that are underway, but whatever is happening, he knows it won't be permanent. Ryder is human. Flippant as she is, she is also in mourning. She deserves solid ground.

Lexi informs him that the season should last four to eight weeks. A month or two of hell before Kallo can get back to normal. In the meantime, Sara can move on.

* * *

With no one else the wiser to his condition, Kallo returns to his place at the helm. Moments after taking his seat, Lexi begins forwarding him more information than he knows what to do with.

Terabytes of pamphlets and diagrams, one worrying link to a discreet manufacturer of plastic sheeting and "interspecies play aides," harrowing videos of adventurous (and well-compensated) asari maidens splashing around in pools with salarian partners. No further mention of Ryder, except by glaring omission.

He avoids his mail terminal after that. Too confusing.

At least he has his hands back under control. Fabulous. Also, fruitless. Shortly after his first tiny victory, his entire body begins to itch.

Everywhere, every inch of skin is alive and uncomfortable, as if Kallo is due for a terrifying biannual molt. Lexi reassures him via mothering omni-tool text that his body is flooding with hormones, readjusting his natural excretions.

 _He might notice some flare-ups,_ she says.

Kallo's body is preparing to transform from the outside-in, apparently. Somehow that thought is less comforting than the somewhat more relatable prospect of shedding his epidermis whole like a snake.

 _Nothing to worry about,_ the doctor coddles, as if he should be pleased.

* * *

He is anything but pleased. To distract himself, he showers. Constantly. Sometimes two or three times a day, alternating hot and cold. Finally, blessedly, halfway through the second bottle of exfoliating soap he's stolen from Vetra, the itching stops.

Only a few hours into his relief, along comes something worse.

His skin begins to… seep. Moisture beading out of every pore, covering him in something clear and slick and flavorless. He'd prefer not to call this newest development _lubricant_ \- Lexi does, with a clarity and ease he refuses to understand - but he can't seem to find less distasteful name for it.

* * *

Today, Ryder is off gallivanting with Peebee and Jaal; getting buried alive in another one of Havarl's overgrown Remnant ruins, no doubt. It's been hours since they hit the first gravity well, and she hasn't checked in since.

Kallo paces across her abandoned galaxy map station, desperate for an occupation. Uncharacteristically out of his seat, standing because he can't bear the pornographic mess that now constantly lines his suit, he grimaces and rubs his fingers together. He evaluates the ease of the slip.

Dammit, it's lube. It's definitely lube.

"You have the bridge, Suvi," he croaks, bolting for the door. "I need a shower."

Suvi jumps. As Kallo sprints aft, she turns to watch his retreat.

"Now? Right now?"

"Yes, right now!"

"Are you s-"

The doors close over her baffled reply.

Kallo throws himself down the port crew ladder, rungs forgotten. He comes to a hard stop at the lower deck and realizes his hands have left a smear on the flawless chrome side rails. He yelps, staring at his palms with accusatory horror, then charges into the shower.

The shower, which is occupied.

By Ryder.

To her credit, Ryder barely flinches, but she does look plenty upset.

Unforgivably, he doesn't leave immediately. He can't tear his eyes from the glittering hollow at the base of her neck. Why is she here? She's in the jungle. She can't be here _and_ in the jungle.

 _Help._

He can't leave. Her hair is wet. The room smells like her. The soaps she uses, Ryder's signatures, invisible and private. He'd never realized it before. Of course, blame the soap. Stop panicking, it's just the soap. Leave. _Leave._

She's not naked, which is a small miracle, but she's close enough. Only a damp towel between Kallo's imagination and the hair-covered madness of human anatomy. One of her legs is up on the waterproof bench outside the communal shower stall, and she's picking at a bright red rash that covers a quarter of her calf.

Ryder stares at him, blinking with the slow awe of a sunbathing lizard. To fill the silence, he starts talking and can't stop.

"You. Remnant. Here. Punching. Radio silence. Vault?"

She takes in a deep breath, apparently on his behalf as well as her own, then slowly replies.

"One of those local dinosaurs spat an acid loogie at me. Hurt like a bitch, so I called off the rest of the scouting. I needed a break from that place, a nice long shower. I told you that twenty minutes ago when I cleared decon…"

"You… did?"

He can't remember, which fills him with terror like he's never felt.

He wrings his slippery hands. Sara's mouth twitches into a soft frown. Her throat glitters temptingly. He wishes he was sticky again.

"Kallo, are you okay?" She adds carefully, "Do you need me to leave?"

 _No._ He feels his head slowly shaking back and forth, though he can't remember any such impulse leaving his brain.

She inches closer and rephrases: "Do you want me to stay?"

Sara, fiddling with the top edge of her towel, which has loosened and dropped dangerously down her chest.

Sara, her hair pearled with moisture that drips to her shoulder, forming tiny rivulets that Kallo can't help but follow with his eyes.

Sara, staring up at him with her softly parted lips, the rock in her throat bobbing as she swallows beneath his unblinking scrutiny.

Sara, suddenly closer, moving her face into his hand.

Some rogue internal force has compelled him to step further into a room he should be fleeing from and touch his fingers to her cheek.

"Sorry," he breathes, forgetting even more words than usual. Words like _weird_ and _idiot_ and _mayday_.

He stands there, unable to breathe, his only movement the slow surrendering of his head, caught in her gravity. Her lips are very close.

Slow enough to grant an easy escape that she does not take, he brings their curious mouths together.

* * *

/ / Second of all: it's not important.

/ ?  
/ UHHGGGHHGGG why are you being such a BOOB?  
/ You're being a BOOB, Kallo.  
/ Sorry.  
/ I know we're not compatible. That way. Sexually.  
/ I get it. Not the salarian wheelhouse.  
/ That's not what I'm after.

/ / Which leaves what?

/ I don't know.  
/ Moral: I care about you.  
/ I care about you a stupid amount, actually, considering what a boob you are.

/ / It's complicated.

/ I do ancient alien Sudoku puzzles for fun, remember?  
/ I don't mind complicated.

/ / You'd be disappointed.

/ Don't make assumptions.  
/ There's something to be said for living in the moment. And for flying blind.  
/ I'd like to talk about this in person, seriously.  
/ No pressure, just talking.

/ Please answer.


	3. Earth Tilted

_I was surrounded by the fluttering  
of wings, nothing but a whirring in my ears,  
and the whole earth tilted and I lost my reason._

* * *

Kissing Sara feels simple and stupid. He never wants to stop.

At first it is strange: their faces pressed tightly together for a few silent, shared breaths. Their lips rest quietly on one another's, their mouths tightly closed, both of them rigid with nerves. Sara's lips feel pillow-soft and almost painfully warm. Her skin is lightly perfumed, like something delicate and well-cultivated.

He thinks of the hydroponics bay on the _Nexus,_ then thinks he shouldn't be thinking about that at all, then thinks he's thinking too much to be any good at this.

After a moment, she tries to pull away.

Brainless, Kallo follows her. He follows her with mad intent, body to body, forehead to forehead, mouth to mouth. His fingers tangle in her hair, then jitter crazily down her neck, finding her pulse. In the wake of his grip, his fingers leave a slick and glistening trail down the length of her throat.

Without thinking, he drags his greased hands along her face, her neck, the forbidden plateau that stretches softly below her collarbones. Her skin grows slicker with each grope. The more freely she slides against him, the more excited she seems to get - _he_ seems to get. They're both very excited, and everything is slippery.

He can't breathe.

* * *

Kallo stares into the freezing, unnavigable wasteland of Voeld's atmosphere, fuming.

A never-ending snowstorm buffets the ship with knife-sharp currents; sheet after sheet of airborne icicles shatter across her shields, a cacophonous rain of glass. The _Tempest_ is fighting him like never before, practically bucking under his hands, as if she yearns to be free of his reins. White knuckled, teeth on edge, he holds fast.

Kilometers below, the landscape unfolds: bleak and pale and frozen, a hunk of dead ice and inhospitable terrain that yawns forever in every direction. That, at least, Kallo might be grateful for. The infinite sobriety of winter. _Good._

His heart is beating thickly, veins full of syrup. He grips the controls and does everything he can to ignore the woman at his back, but the task is beyond him.

Ryder and Kallo are alone for the first time in days. The _Tempest_ creaks and groans under the storm, but the bridge is otherwise silent. Here, blocking the only exit, she has him cornered. Even Suvi has abandoned him. After hours spent running every environmental scan she could think of, the moment that Ryder steps foot on the bridge, the so-called scientist decides to make an impromptu run to the galley for a pick-me-up. Suvi can't dawdle forever; Kallo will need her soon, no matter how dearly he might like to strangle her. She is the only fool aboard who is qualified to feed him the endless stream of flight data and compensatory measures necessary for landfall. Landing on an alien world is an intense and unforgiving prospect, made all the more severe by current conditions.

He cringes.

Indeed. The atmosphere is frigid.

Behind him, Ryder stands stiffly, suited up. He doesn't have to look at her to know the figure she cuts. In his mind's eye, he can't help but imagine her with perfect clarity - down to the latest configuration of her wetware. She favors an eye-catching mishmash, tasteless but memorable: curvy angaran pieces dramatically contrasted by geometric rem-tech nonsense, all painted in devil-may-care colors. The effect is show-offy and immature, but she makes it work, appearing both heroic and appealing in a costume that, on anyone else in the universe, would look patently absurd.

He'd never admit it aloud, but even drunk and blindfolded, Kallo could paint Ryder's armor by memory. A base coat of sharp gesso-white, setting off the rich earth tones of her skin. Some florid, sun-orange accents, just to be cheeky. All tied together with a few clean lines of Initiative blue, bright and clear as the sky.

And the shapes of her are even easier to recall, a sculpture ready-made, the forms so familiar he can almost feel her rounding beneath his hands. The upward heave of her chest, the restless bend in her shoulders. The bold outline of her pelvis cocked arrogantly to one side, an alien swell decorated with grenades glinting as prettily as baubles…

He's breathing heavily. Embarrassed, he blinks and forces himself out of a fevered haze. With a jolt, he realizes Ryder is speaking.

"-you listening? Whatever. I'm sorry. And it won't happen again."

He says nothing, and feels her confidence flagging at his back. Almost there. Almost through this.

"Never mind." Her weakened attempt at a casual laugh comes out as a rough cough. Covering, she shifts into a stilted, professional tone. "We need to discuss mission specifics."

Stiffly, he nods. _"LZ_ in thirty minutes. I can't drop us any faster than that. If they want the Moshae-"

"This isn't about rescuing the Moshae. It's about your performance."

Kallo's shoulders tense all the way up to meet his jaw; he has to breathe deep and slow just to force his limbs back down to the console.

Ryder bites off each word, sounding pained. "Lexi has informed me of a medical condition that could be affecting your ability to fly. She hasn't issued mandatory leave yet, but she said I should talk to you about it before it gets that serious."

"She... did."

"She didn't give me specifics, and I didn't ask. As far as I'm concerned it really is space pneumonia." Her voice gentles. "I just want to know you're okay" She immediately realizes her error and readjusts; "I-I mean, as Pathfinder, I need some assurances-"

"I'm fine."

Behind him, he hears nervous shuffling, foot to foot, back and forth.

"Would it help to have some time off? R&R on the Nexus? Your replacement would only be temporary, until you're feeling-"

"Let someone else fly the _Tempest?_ Are you crazy?" Saying the words aloud, he chokes. Struggling for breath, he grips the controls and glares into Voeld's atmosphere. Furiously, tenaciously, he clings to his oldest, dearest lifeline. "I'm not going anywhere. I'm not sick. The… _problem_ will be gone in a few weeks, once I... It's…" He fumbles. "It's nothing. Practically an allergic reaction." His voice slips, betrayed. "Lexi shouldn't have told you."

"Doctor T'Perro did her job. I need to know that you can still do yours." Her voice is much closer now, and her proximity sends hot sparks down the back of his neck. A rich, deep thrill flares down the length of his traitorous spine. Softly, she says, "The last thing I want is a different pilot. Kallo, you're… and I'm supposed to be… I may be a crap Pathfinder but I still can't let anybody compromise our mission. Even…" A pause, too intuitive to be an accident. "More than anything, I don't want you to compromise _yourself._ If you need time, take it." She makes a strange sound, a laughing grunt. "Because I don't think I can bring myself to ground you…"

She doesn't touch him, but her armored hand reaches out, clutching the back of his chair hard enough to make the upholstery squeak.

He finally looks at her, barely turning his head. "Is this payback?"

She stares through him, her confusion fresh and genuine. He watches her put the pieces together, then he readies the final blow.

He grunts disdainfully and mutters, "Threatening to take away my wings just because I won't date you? Really, Ryder - that's low."

A flash of offended rage, then she stills, face falling. She looks skewered; but that look pierces him all the more, deflating every scrap of his careful pretense. Knowing what he's done, he feels idiotic and infinitesimal, and far too close to taking it all back, confessing the whole truth in one blubbering rush.

But maybe, just maybe… the worst is now behind them.

Unsteadily, she releases her death grip on his chair and steps away.

With the timing of bad comedians, Jaal and Liam gambol onto the bridge, slapping shoulders and playfully trying to one-up one another. Friendly ribbing and machismo: how to do the most damage with a single shot.

Kallo turns back to the navigation array, shaking.

 _Bullseye._

* * *

Halting for breath, he pulls back a few millimeters, just enough to replace his mouth with his thumb, spreading moisture across her lips.

This is stupid. So, so stupid. What if he's excreting poison? The doctor would have told him if he was going to excrete poison. _Right?_

Sara's tongue darts out, pink and curious. His hand tightens on her face and he drags his thumb along her bottom lip, smearing with wider, firmer strokes. When her teeth part to release a groan, he slowly slides his thumb into her mouth. Sara's eyelids droop, intoxicated. He watches, waiting without breath as her tongue massages the pad of his thumb, but she doesn't choke. She doesn't die.

Perhaps he isn't poisonous. All the same, he feels thunder and lightning roll through his blood. He knows this can't be safe.

* * *

Ten hours after Kallo deals Sara the wound, she returns to him on a stretcher.

Lexi meets the away team at the airlock, wasting no time. Kallo rises from his seat, his arm twitching towards the stretcher, where Sara's small body lies prone and bleeding. Before he can speak, she is spirited down the corridor by Jaal and Liam. The Moshae herself, very much alive, limps stubbornly after them, leaning on Lexi's arm.

For Kallo, there are more immediate concerns. Orders barked to him by an increasingly frantic Cora. Take off, _now._ Leave orbit. Set course for Aya. Evasion tactics: shaking any Kett vessels that might hope to track the _Tempest_ back to the angaran stronghold.

 _Yes ma'am._

Cora's orders, along with her straightforward survival tactics, are enough to keep Kallo occupied for a few hours. But his attention wears thin, and when the ship is cruising safely at FTL, with no fires left for him to put out, his quiet calm evaporates in a few short blinks.

Once his mind drifts to Sara, the dangerous spiral of his thoughts cannot be rerouted. But he knows he cannot move. Abandoning the helm would only put Sara at risk. Descending on med-bay would only make Lexi's job more difficult.

The long, bleak hours drag on. The cold streaks of passing stars offer Kallo none of their usual relief. No update comes, no ship-wide announcement of Sara's status. Unable to sit still in that unnatural hush, Kallo paces the bridge in slow, laborious circuits, doing everything he can not to scream.

Halfway to Aya, trying to keep herself occupied, Suvi leaves her station and goes belowdecks without a word. She returns moments later, carrying cleaning solution and rags. For a moment, Kallo doesn't understand what she's doing, why she's being so bizarre, going on a cleaning spree in the middle of a crisis… Then she kneels. She wipes the floor, and the rag comes back stained black-red, dirty with blood.

Sara's blood.

* * *

He wonders when his limbs got so shaky. Sara steadies him, wrapping her arms around his back, her hands notching neatly into his shoulder blades. She yanks him down, and he crash-lands into her open mouth.

The gliding heat of her slicked-up mouth opening under him… the wet press of her tongue meeting his… the clean scrape of her teeth as she bites his lower lip… the hitch of her breath when she nudges their hips together…

He feels it then, a lurch in his insides. A _wham,_ like the ship's engines blowing out, staggering him. Where the catastrophe originates, he doesn't know, but he feels it coursing through him, a shudder, a quake, a landslide… rioting toward his groin.

He pulls back, disoriented. Sara looks disheveled, assaulted; her skin has gone red from his reckless explorations, and her lips are swollen and raw.

Terrified, he rips his hands away.

* * *

"You need to sit down, young one."

Kallo stops pacing, startled. The Moshae's voice, though heavy with authority, is gilded with a warm edge. It reminds him of the world-worn kindness of an old, wise relative. Or so he assumes. Back in the Milky Way, Kallo had never cared to know his biological relations. And now, here in Andromeda, he knows that every last one of them is dead.

He aught to be sad about that, he thinks. Later.

The hour is late - well into the third shift, lights dim and engines coasting on reserves. Everyone but Cora is asleep, and the commando is currently staked out on the bridge, glowering. Kallo had presumed - upon finding the rescued Moshae laying motionless in the shadows of med-bay, breathing quietly on her side - that the angaran elder was deeply asleep.

That had been foolish.

"Sit," she commands. She points to an empty stool, the one nearest Sara. Feeling scolded by a complete stranger, Kallo obeys.

"Good. Your fretting is giving me a headache. Now... keep sitting," she chides, "and worry in stillness for a moment. Feel her hand. It will help."

He looks at the Moshae, quirking his head and hoping for a reprieve, but she gestures toward Sara. Again, he does as he is told.

"How does that feel?" she asks.

Instinctively, his thumb traces the long, curved line that bisects Sara's palm.

"Warm," he says.

"Yes. Warm and alive. She is strong and stubborn, and will not die."

He stares at Sara's hand, unable to speak.

"Stop looking so humiliated. It is a great privilege to watch over the ones we love while they rest. She will find her way back to you soon, and then you can leave me to recuperate in peace for an hour, yes?"

"I don't-" Kallo stops his mouth immediately. "With utmost respect, Moshae Sjefa, I think you misunderstand my intentions."

"I understand perfectly well. You are the one who is confused."

He knows he should release Sara's hand. But he can't. He can't. Stubbornly, he shakes his head. The Moshae clicks her tongue; in his translator, she sounds annoyed.

"Earlier, while you were wandering the ship in a heartbroken frenzy, Jaal told me why you worry, though I reminded him I could see it clearly enough for myself." She laughs and Kallo flinches, offended. "You are anything but subtle, child. The entire ship knows. _I_ know, and I am old and tired and not at all interested."

"I'm sorry-"

"Oh hush." She waves him down with a matronly smile. "You are different from your shipmates, that is true enough." She speaks quietly, contemplatively. "Jaal called you a _salarian._ Does that matter? Are you and the Pathfinder so very different?"

"Yes. No! I mean… I… Salarians live short lives. Most of us never feel the need to… are never called upon to... The situation simply doesn't arise..." He huffs out a breath, bitter and tired. "I don't even know you."

"All the better. What do you have to lose? Humor a stubborn old alien."

He exhales sharply. "It doesn't matter anyway. I'll only disappoint her. She'll move on. She'll outlive a bad memory of me by eighty, ninety... maybe a hundred years." He looks at Sara's face, all of her features softened by sleep: oblivious. "Maybe I'll make it long enough to see her start a family…"

The Moshae lets loose an undignified noise. "Are all of your people so given over to self-pity, or are you uniquely afflicted? If you have so little time together, what a waste to spend your precious hours moping around, denying yourself."

"I-"

"Enough about you! You love her - that much becomes immediately obvious to anyone who shares your oxygen. What does _she_ want? What of _her_ feelings? Have you never asked?"

A knot of shame clenches in his gut. From her first handshake, despite her losses and her fear, Sara Ryder has been nothing but honest and straightforward with him. Kind and considerate and patient... and confused.

"Ah. That tortured silence sounds like love to me. But then again, you are exceptionally strange." The Moshae flops back down to her bed, turning away. "Now, please make up your sweet, stubborn, childish mind." He thinks he can hear her smiling, suppressing a laugh. "Stay strong. And clear."

One of Kallo's hands tightens on Sara's fingers, the other flies to his heart, searching.

* * *

Eos. Their first planet - their first successful landfall as Pathfinder and pilot.

Her first scouting trip is long and exhaustive, and it goes on without him, dragging on for hours in some wild, unknowable distance. For half a torturous day, then another - for a full standard cycle, he waits.

Sitting there, Kallo tries to make small-talk with Suvi, but there are too few radio calls and too many shots fired; when Ryder's signal goes dead eighteen hours in, he can no longer concentrate at all. The threat of losing the Pathfinder to errant wilderness is already immediate. The fear comes in small, invisible bolts of painful surprise, sharp as skipped heartbeats.

Then, without warning, Ryder resets the sky.

She returns with blue skies at her back, her smile brighter than the sun. Up close, Kallo sees she is covered in dust and bruises, and that Cora and Vetra are keeping her upright.

Shoving off her squad-mates, Ryder limps across the bridge on her own. "Only a twisted ankle, relax," she grumbles, then announces that she comes bearing gifts.

Tiny test samples of pale earth, their contents sifted from the newly viable topsoil of Eos. Kallo watches Ryder hand the first sample to Suvi, grinning. "The _Nexus_ is deploying personnel to establish our first scientific outpost. To break ground. But I beat them to it."

Suvi holds the dirt to her heart and sing-songs: "The first sample for my personal collection! I'll treasure this always- with this, I can add fifty more pages to my paper- no! Seventy!"

Kallo thinks that all sounds awfully stupid - that is, until Ryder rounds on him. Still hobbling, she skips crookedly around the flight deck guardrail and puts a hand on his chair to keep herself from tumbling. The impact rattles him. Hovering above, her face is radiant, breathless...

The Pathfinder, grinning down at him, her cheeks reddening with blood.

The Pathfinder, holding out a present, her fingers trembling and small.

The Pathfinder, whispering giddily, her breath skipping across his face.

 _For my pilot. Our first piece of home._

Impulse takes over when she sways on her feet. He reaches out to steady her, and their hands get tangled up, rough and sudden. Tutting sweetly, Vetra comes to collect the punch-drunk Pathfinder. As Ryder is dragged away, presumably to convalesce in med-bay, Kallo holds her hands a moment too long. He feels Ryder tenderly palming him the sample of earth, and she winks.

Later, when he is alone in his bunk, Kallo considers the gift. He turns it to and fro, watching the grains settle and shift, miniature waves of sediment that sweetly clink inside the glass. Ryder must have prepared the samples bare-handed, because she has left a single fingerprint behind, a stubborn impression in dried clay.

Feeling an unfamiliar tightness, Kallo holds the trinket against his hollow chest - and pauses.

He remembers the small pocket sewn on the inside of his flight suit. A place for tiny secrets, it is a minuscule compartment intended for emergency stimulants and self-destruct codes. There, hidden directly over his heart, Sara's affection slides home perfectly - a talisman of golden dust.

* * *

He falls asleep in med-bay, clinging to Sara with one hand, clutching a tiny sample of dirt with the other.

He slides into a brief but vivid dream, wherein he is strangled by the _Tempest's_ collective pet pyjak while Lexi hovers nearby, taking careful notes. A small mewling sound invades the scene. At first he thinks it's the pyjak trying to lecture him about living a life of moronic denial, but… no… it can't be… when did the pyjak learn to speak?

 _Kallo?_

He wakes with a grunt and tries to rub the sleep from his eyes, but winds up smacking himself in the nictitating membrane with a hard cylinder of glass. Sara's gift. He squeezes it in his palm and turns.

Looking, he finds Sara. Alive. Awake.

Meeting his eyes in the dark, she lets out a thin wheeze; something like a sad, tired laugh.

"Kallo? What are you-"

"Shh. Don't speak." He says it automatically, because he feels he aught to. Coming out of his mouth, it sounds exceptionally stupid.

"Oh shut up. It's my deathbed. I'll speak if I want to." She laughs again, easing a little further into her pillows. "How long have you been here?"

He tries to answer in concrete terms, but finds he can't. His hand slides across her palm, over her wrist, up her arm, across her shoulder, counting bones and muscles and tendons and blessings, but not time…

Finally, he stutters, "I guess… a while…"

"That long, huh?"

"Sara, I've-"

"Is this the part where you're finally honest with me about what happened on Havarl?"

He nods. Leaning closer, he tries to hide the annoying prickle of moisture gathering in the corners of his eyes.

"Yes, I promise. But first I have to get through the part where I apologize profusely and tell you I've been a coward and an idiot, and that I think that I might be in lo-"

She lifts her hand to his neck, quieting him. Wincing, she exerts what little energy she has, gently pulling his forehead to hers. "Can we skip straight to the part where we kiss and make up? Because otherwise… I'm going back to sleep."

Kissing Sara feels simple and stupid. He never wants to stop.


	4. Spray of Stars

I've altered the naming scheme of the chapters to echo the poetry. A minor detail, but it helps me sleep better, haha. More importantly, I've made a few plot/timeline edits to previous chapters. Nothing huge, just some tweaks for consistency.

This chapter contains references to alcohol use. Also, we're finally getting to the wacky interspecies shenanigans. So maybe don't read this in front of your boss.

Strauss II's "An der schönen blauen Donau", Op. 314 is my suggested listening for this chapter, though it's certainly optional. The _2001: A Space Odyssey_ audio-visual version is ideal.

* * *

 _You saw the great sky turn blacker, you saw the spray of stars  
_ _and your hair got tangled in the windscreen wiper._

* * *

/ Hey.  
/ Hey you.  
/ Why don't you come up and see me sometime?

/ / Because you're below decks…

/ [User has forwarded an attachment]  
/ [Open Mae_West_Best_Of . vid? - Y/N?]

/ / What is this?  
/ / What am I even watching right now?  
/ / Is this some kind of test?

/ HAHA!

/ / You do know it's almost 2820, right?  
/ / This vid has got to be at least 850 years old...  
/ / Also, that's a misquote.  
/ / The actual line is, "Why don't you come up sometime and see me?"

/ My body hurts and I'm boooored.  
/ I asked Liam to forward me something to watch while I 'convalesce'  
/ The man has got a boner for old vids.  
/ Really really REALLY old.

/ / Have you slept? How are you feeling?

/ Like I said...  
/ Why don't you come up and see me sometime?

* * *

The first time Kallo visits the Pathfinder's private cabin, it's to file a noise complaint.

After Ryder's success resetting the vault on Eos, the crew is too astonished to celebrate. There is no drinking, no back-patting, barely even a party, except for an awkward meeting to welcome aboard two new self-interested shipmates. Once that obligation is met, everyone takes a collective breath and the crew promptly retire to their separate bunks.

For the first few hours, Kallo enjoys a lonely kind of peace. The _Tempest's_ engines are cold and quiet. The ship slumbers sweetly around him; even the view-screen is in low-power mode. Dimly projected on the glass at half opacity, he watches the expanse of Eos' night sky, tracking the progress of her moon.

Kallo stares at that reborn vista with no small amount of wonder. Millions of dim, twinkling stars stare back at him, beckoning.

He drifts into that distance, easing into a light but peaceful nap beneath a blanket of stars. He dreams of burying his feet in moist black earth, squeezing sand between his toes, falling backwards into a loose snowdrift. Sensations that evaporate before he can savor them - a parade of immediate pleasures, immediately forgotten.

He blinks, suddenly awake.

Below, there is thumping. Rhythmic, throbbing, bass-heavy. The resonant frequencies of bad, bad music.

Well. That's an unpleasant quirk for the Pathfinder to have. Easily ignored, he supposes… for a while, anyway. But the pulses are a little too regular, the volume a little to pernicious. And it's only getting louder.

He busies himself, not wanting to come down on her like some nagging prude, but there are only so many diagnostics Kallo can run on a brand-new ship… And when the same mindless, droning _thumpa-thumpa_ track starts to repeat on a constant loop, he runs out of adequate distractions. All of his omni-tool pings are stonewalled.

Molars grinding, legs twitching, he tries not to bang on the floor with his foot. After all, he's not her upstairs neighbor. This is _his_ bridge, not some piss-stained alleyway behind a Terminus dive bar.

He stomps anyway, but nothing changes.

For a wild second, Kallo considers spitefully disabling the onboard gravity… only to remember he's planet-side for once. Grounded on an alien world tamed by a Pathfinder with objectively, _offensively_ terrible taste in music. Historic the occasion may be, but all that matters now is that the laws of physics have suddenly become irreversible, and Kallo is out of options. If he wants her to shut up, he's going to have to go down there…

Suddenly, silence.

Kallo stiffens and holds his breath.

He counts the seconds with his heartbeat in double-time. One… two… three…

…It returns. Another repeat of _Thumpa-Thumpa No. 2 in F-U Major_.

Snarling, he springs from his chair. A few furious, leaping steps take him to Ryder's door, where he skips the courteous chime and goes straight from zero to battering ram.

"Hey! Ryder! Excuse me!" He winds up for a hard knock but nearly falls on his face when the door _whooshes_ away. She'd left it unlocked.

Her noise rolls over him, louder and more inescapable than ever. Stunned by the sloppy cacophony of it, he stumbles into the room, shaking his head in a fruitless attempt to just _make it stop._

"SAM!" he yells. "Mute this insufferable racket… _NOW."_

The AI doesn't respond immediately, which strikes Kallo as more than a little rude. A super-powered machine intelligence playing favorites. Nothing disturbing about _that._

In the din, the only other thing to greet Kallo is a _smell:_ a pungent, humid atmosphere, thick as grease. High-proof alcohol and the reek of human sweat. Too much of both. Then his eyes land on the Pathfinder and he freezes, stunned.

Confronting him is the unadulterated sight of Ryder's loose, billowy sleep shorts, spread wide.

Ryder is sprawled lengthwise on her couch in an unconscious heap. One foot dangles to the floor. Her other foot points directly at Kallo, leg thrown over the back of the couch so freely that he feels slapped by it.

Instantly paralyzed, he stares at this incredible revelation. Sara Ryder's cute, utilitarian underwear: they're blue as the sky. A simple and unassuming scrap of _almost nothing_ that clings and stretches… _suggesting._ A sharp contrast where the soft flesh of her thigh meets the swell of her groin.

 _Oh._

He should leave. Yes. Now.

He turns, but like some kind of vindictive trap, the door has already closed behind him. Speaking of vindictive machines, Kallo's implant tingles, then SAM echoes loudly over the local comm:

"Please clarify your request, Flight Lieutenant Jath."

* * *

Standing in front of Sara's door, Kallo fidgets with his jacket, his sleeves, his belt buckle. He clears his throat a few times and considers how best to knock.

 _No, no, don't knock, idiot. Use the chime._

He extends a trembling finger toward the haptic interface, but the door opens before he can touch it. Sara stands there, crooked and tousled.

"How was Aya's vault?" he asks. The words just _happen,_ before he even knows what he's saying.

She blinks for a moment, then gently yanks on his elbow and draws him into the room.

"Oh... Informative, I guess. The Archon wants a thing on someplace called _Meridian_ and we've got to stop him. There's some angaran resistance leader who might know where the Archon is, so I've got to find _him_ … You know. Cat and mouse. Pathfinder stuff… yadda yadda…"

"Yadda yadda? I don't know, that all sounds kind of important. Wouldn't you rather I take us somewhere, maybe try to get a head start-"

"Later."

"...Later. And until then?"

"You never did have that drink with me, Kallo."

"Oh, I don't really imbibe-"

She pushes a glass into his chest, then unscrews the top of an unpretentious vessel. "It's not booze. It's some kind of juice. Jaal brought this massive crate aboard. It's good."

He takes a sniff. Sweet and floral, a bit tangy. One sip confirms: it is good.

Sara sits on the end of her bed.

"Now, since you promised so nicely when you thought I was going to die… Why don't you finally tell me about Havarl?"

* * *

At the sound of SAM's voice, Ryder wakes with a start. In her confusion, she jumps halfway off the couch and knocks over a bottle. For better or worse, the bottle has long been emptied, nothing spilled but curses.

"Oh _shit!"_ she slurs. Dizzly, she swerves upright, triggering a head rush that Kallo can feel from half a room away. She smacks her omni-tool - once, twice, three times - before she finds the right interface.

The music doesn't stop completely (such refined motor control seems beyond her) but the mood does change. A new song… a _piece,_ actually. Much, much quieter, all timid strings and frolicking wind instruments.

"Sorry," she says. She blinks furiously and squints in his direction with so much apologetic intensity that he worries he might catch fire. "I'm so, so sorry," she says, wiping her face. "I found Dad's playlist and I guess I got carried away. I think I fell asleep on the repeat button..."

She flexes her back and cracks her neck - apparently the 'repeat button' had not been particularly comfortable to sleep on.

"You mean. All that…" He coughs. "Music. Those weren't _your_ selections?"

Ryder yawns and shakes her head, slumping into the couch. "Hell no. This is, though. Hope you like thousand-year-old Austrian snoozers." She points to the ceiling as if that's explanation enough, but Kallo knows the gesture is meaningless. The speakers are cleverly hidden in the floor.

Ryder's music fills him with chastened pause. A brassy but pleasant waltz, steadily growing in intensity.

 _Oh._

Misinterpreting his silence, she shakes her head, embarrassed. "Yeah, I know it's schmaltzy. I can turn it off…"

"Don't."

She blushes visibly, then turns away. Mumbling, she says, "I'm sorry if I kept you awake," as she rummages around in her couch cushions for something. "Hey. Stay a while, huh? Want any- yeah! A drink? I have… um… _this_ stuff?"

She picks up a bottle and squints at it, trying to decipher a sweeping, florid, mostly ornamental Asari script. "Ssshsllllshhhennnananna? I think. Yeah. Milky Way's finest ' _shlenninaaa…hhhummina.'_ It tastes like it was _super_ expensive… six hundred years ago. Before it went bad. Now it just tastes like butts and ass and more butts."

"Mmmmm… yes. You know, after that glowing _sommelier_ review, I think I'll pass."

Nonetheless, he steps a few paces further into the room.

"Aww mannnn…" She whines high in her throat, frowning at the bottle in her hand. "I can't drink any more of this crap by myself."

"So… don't?" he suggests, keeping his voice bland.

She rambles over him. "See that _sounds_ smart on the _outside…_ but on the _inside?_ " She clenches a fist and pounds it against her chest. The impact resonates through the room, surprisingly hollow. "I kind of _have_ to drink it, you know? Not because of-" A crude mime, guzzling from the unopened bottle, then she puts it down on the coffee table next to its sibling. "This one's Dad's. That one's for Scott. He brought one for all three of us, apparently."

She glances away to the empty bottle on the floor, moping: "And I already drank _mine."_

Kallo teeters, braving a few more steps, hovering near the couch. Ryder pats the cushion next to her, looking hopeful. Looking terribly lonely.

"Might be better to share this with your brother," he says, pointing to the pair of still-unopened bottles.

"Yeah…" Her voice goes thin, wavering in her throat. "I- I guess. When he wakes up. If he-"

He sits down next to her, silencing the thought.

* * *

"Thank you for telling me," she says, eyes on the floor. "Getting the whole picture…" A puff of air, then she wipes her face with one hand. "I'm sorry if I ever made you feel pressured or… I don't even _know._ Oh man, I can only imagine how confusing this has been for you."

"For both of us," he corrects. "I haven't exactly been communicative."

The quirk of her eyebrow says it all. "Is this… is it real?" She can't meet his eyes. "Everything you're going through. Everything you're feeling. Can you… are you… is this your choice?"

He wants to move closer to her, but his body won't budge. Instead, he clutches his empty glass and feels something in his chest go _whomp._

"Some alarming physical changes are underway, certainly. But Lexi insists that everything I feel, everything I… _want._ My attraction to you. That condition was…" He stares into the dregs of his juice. "Pre-existing."

Sara laughs dryly, wringing her hands across her knees. She's wearing shorts and a loose top, everything rumpled from a recent nap. Her face still bears a few pillow marks, soft red impressions dug in along her cheek.

"If you didn't mean for this to happen, I don't want us to rush into anything." She bunches up her face, groaning. "I don't really understand what I'm feeling _either._ I mean, I know it's not the same, but I never, ever thought, 'Yeah! Salarians! They're sexy!'" She flinches. "Not that I mean you're not good looking… actually _you, specifically,_ are _very_ good looking-" In a garbled rush, she corrects, "-but that's not all I care about! I- I mean! UM. Uh huhh… Oh Jesus I'm bad at this. Please throw me out the airlock so I can die with some dignity."

He smiles, feels his joints loosening. "Sorry. I can't space you just now. We're grounded." He puts down his glass, replacing it with her hand. "Well, Pathfinder, as your pilot I feel it is my duty to inform you: it appears we are hopelessly lost."

A small laugh. "At least we're _both_ clueless. That's comforting, right?"

"Actually, it is." He guides her hand to his chest, gently leading her fingers to the flat, vulnerable concavity above his heart. "See? My pulse is only beating _twice_ the normal speed. That's a marked improvement over yesterday."

"I can feel it…" Her hand spreads out, exploring. Carefully, tenderly, permanently curious. Sounding short of breath, she whispers, "Your heart beats so fast. And so strong."

"Oh? Yeah. Right there I'm all cartilage." He tries to laugh it off. "It's a weak point."

"I'll be careful," she says.

Huge and round, her eyes stare up at him, a dark, cool gray like the center of a storm. He threads his fingers into her hair, letting that strange weather wash over him. One last breath before the plunge.

"So will I."

* * *

Kallo hands Ryder another glass of water; she drains half of it in one gulp. He watches the corded muscles in her neck shifting around vigorous, greedy swallows, and his eyes get stuck in the dewy valley between her collarbones.

Sympathetically, he clears his throat.

"So. Before? Alec Ryder really listened to… _that?_

She wipes her mouth and puts down the empty glass.

"I guess." Meaning she doesn't know. She tries to cover. "Dad likes weird stuff. Dad's weird." A terrible pause, as the realization hits her. "Dad… _was_ _…_ "

"I'm sorry, Ryder. I mean- I should have said something earlier. I'm terribly sorry about your father."

She looks away, deflecting his gaze. "We weren't close."

"Does that make it easier?"

"No. I guess not." Hesitant to talk about her own pain, she shrugs with one shoulder and quickly changes the subject. "What about you? Did anyone come with you? Any of your family?"

"No." He laughs thinly. "I was never particularly close to my genetic relatives. That's probably for the best. Salarian families are… complicated."

"Sounds like there's a story there."

"Maybe, and a million more just like it. How well-versed are you in haplodiploid family trees?"

She makes a face.

"Exactly how I feel. Some people turn cataloging their relatives into a passion project, but it never mattered much to me. I met my mother _once,_ during a scholarship evaluation. She was… not impressed."

"And… you really didn't have any father at all?"

"You skipped the salarian chapter in xeno-biology, didn't you?" He gives her a sarcastic look and she rolls her eyes, laughing. "Don't worry, everybody does. It's true - only girls have the complete genome, and they get whisked off to live with their mothers. The rest of us make do without parents."

"That's…" She pauses. "That sounds so lonely."

"Oh no. Never lonely. I grew up in a clutch of twenty-six. I was drowning in brothers."

"Is that a literal expression?"

"What do you mean?"

"Like… um… _oh God I'm about to ask a stupid question."_ she moves closer, turns a deep shade of crimson-purple, and whispers, "Kallo… were you ever… _a tadpole?"_

He stares at her long enough to study every inch of her terrified face. Long enough to catch every humiliated twitch of muscle.

Feeling airborne, as if Ryder has just depressurized the cabin, he fractures clear down the middle and begins to laugh. He laughs high and loud and for such a long time he thinks he might die.

"I'm so sorry!" she says, her voice muffled by her own hands. "That was so rude!"

Still laughing, his breath coming in waves, Kallo peels Ryder's fingers from her face. Gathering her small hands in his, he claps one palm over her knuckles as patronizingly as he can, thus acknowledging the stupidness of her question. So, so stupid.

"Yes," he sighs. "I was a tadpole. But I remember about as much of that stage of my life as you do. _You_ were a tadpole too, you know. Or… something. Humans have to do everything so _internally_. And with so much extra _gore."_

He makes a confused, all-encompassing gesture toward her stomach.

"Fair." She laughs. "You know…" Looking at their tangled hands, she tightens her grip. "Maybe this is a stupid thing to whine about, but ever since we lost Dad, everybody has been so professional… so distant. And with Scott gone…"

He squeezes. "Your brother will pull through."

"Yeah. He… I went to check on him before we left the _Nexus._ I sat there like a stupid little kid, just holding his hand." She laughs weakly, and it sounds wet. "It felt good, you know? Just to sit with him. Like this."

Her hands turn and flex, four curious fingers adjusting to the breadth of Kallo's palms, to the span between his fingers.

Quietly, like a sigh of relief, she says, "Thank you for being so kind to me. I'm sorry about all the chaos."

Up close, he can see the dried tracks where her tears have been hastily wiped away, can see one last ghost lingering on her jaw: a little circle, white and dry. He thinks of wiping it for her, but knows that would be rude, entirely too intimate.

Instead, he tries words, but they won't quite fit in his mouth. "Ryder, you don't have to-"

"Sara. Please. It's… right now, can I just be _Sara?"_

"Alright, Sara. Hey. You missed a spot."

He raises one hand and scrubs the stubborn salt-crust from her jaw.

* * *

 _sara backlit by a storm  
_ _her skin glittering with mist_

 _her body, her face, the air between them; too close  
_ _charged with some alien current, he stares at her mouth_

 _the first crack of lighting through the seething blue  
_ _the smell of her mixing with the damp and the rain_

 _he'll never forget_

* * *

 _for a long, long time, they kiss_

Hot, wet. Sparks and spit in his mouth. Under his tongue, a nondescript flavor that Kallo's brain labels bland but nonetheless forces every molecule of his body into perfect alignment. A crystal lattice, tense and vital, climbing for stars, for glory, for Sara. Together with honest intentions; no reason to stop, no reason to be afraid. Winded and glowing red, like she's run into his arms from some other dimension, Sara reaches for him again and again. She wraps her courageous arms around him and won't let go.

 _here, now, he needs more_

Her fingers everywhere: his back, his neck, his face. Racing down his arms to secure his hands as he roams and robs in turn. Thick, delicious sensations rush through his brain, captured specimens exquisitely crystallized, lingering forever. A sugared fury tingles down his throat. The hunger settles behind his eyes, burns deep in his arteries. He wants to devour her; an alien delicacy offered fearlessly, generously. Her breath commingling with his. A haze, a fog, a cloud of gorgeous steam. Her teeth, smooth and sharp on his lip. Her tongue painting the top of his mouth.

 _he pushes her down into the bed_

Her hips rising into his palm. The staccato of her ribs jumping beneath the pads of his fingers. The bold surge of her body, uncontrollable as a lunar tide. Her heavy calf along his thigh, dragging him down. The bed beneath them, sheets perfumed contrarily, a duet in sweat and soap, muffling the frenetic alto of her moans. He answers, over and over. Sounds he's never made before. A brand new repertoire.

 _he discovers the rest of her_

Her shirt, lifting away. Her shorts soon after. Those sky-blue underwear making their glorious, sunlit return. The swell of her breasts, strange and soft beneath his hands as he memorizes their foreign curvature. The taste of her skin, the hidden flavor of her forbidden territories. The raw, musk-white smell of her chest invading his lungs like heavy incense, smothering yet divine.

 _she begs for his hands_

Under that blue fabric, that wide-open eternity that calls to him from a dream, he finds a new frontier. Her heat and humidity, his season unleashed. His fingers grow slick with his own excitement, but she is already wet.

 _what do I do_

She shows him. Slow at first… then faster. Light and skittish, their tremulous prelude… and then once more, with feeling. Her head falling back, the long, thrilled stretch of her neck. Her cries rising in pitch, doubling and tripling in time. Her thighs trembling. Her breath catching.

 _like that, like that_

His hands grabbing all he can take, his fingers sliding inside her. The heat and pressure of her body, enfolding him. A collapsing supernova. A glorious riptide. Her hips rolling and rising like the sea, drowning him.

 _yes_

He dives into the breach with both eyes open, mouth on hers, wide and hungry. Together, they tremble and gasp. Together, they drink the foam and breathe the salt.

 _yes_

She rises and breaks. Her breath fills his lungs, an astonished wind blowing him to some undiscovered horizon.

 _yes_

Beautifully, she disintegrates.


End file.
